Robinson... How Do We Think He's Doing ?

[Busta Nut]

Just to point out, I am not anti-Scottish. I am more anti-Old Skool

[Inthebasement]

On 1/20/2019 at 9:10 PM, David said:

It's easy for the fans to just say "bin him, get him tae fuck," but the club actually have to weigh up the very serious pros and cons of sacking a manager at this stage of the season.

Look at the facts.

We're 9th. We're 7 clear of Accies, we're 9 clear of St Mirren, and we're 11 clear of Dundee. For St Mirren to catch us we'd need to drop 3 games while they win 3 games. They've won 3 games all season. For Dundee to catch us we'd need to drop 3 games, draw 2 and they'd need to double the amount of points they've won all season. Dundee have won twice this season.

We're 8 points behind Hibs in 8th. We're not catching them. 

At worst we're looking at a 10th finish, if somehow Accies manage to suddenly go on a run while we lose.

Granted, we're poor, but we're still better than the clubs below us, which is all that matters for now. Robinson knows the players, and can get the minimum that he needs from them.

We're out of both cups. 

If any club happens to be sniffing around Robinson, there's a better chance he moves in the summer. We waive the compensation we'd be due, we part ways. We could then bring a new manager in with a clean slate. We have a fair amount of players out of contract this summer, so there's going to be the chance to make big changes. 

There's also a wider range of choice in the summer as far as managers go.

Or, we could roll the dice and bump the manager just now.

We'd likely need to pay him off. He's got a contract until May 2020, so unless he's secretly loaded I don't see him walking away from a contract without another job to go to.

We either appoint someone on an interim basis, or we grab someone from the slim pickings that's available at this time of year. 

The new manager comes in and has to hit the ground running. These aren't his players, and chances are we can't shift many until the summer. 

We run the risk of total collapse, which we've seen happen elsewhere.

I know this isn't the answer folk want to hear, but the smart choice is riding this wave of mediocrity until the summer. At that point we can reassess, we've got a lot of players with contracts up so if a new manager is coming in he gets a clean slate to work with.

The only way I see Robbo going before the summer is if we get another club wanting him this season, or if we collapse and end up in danger of the drop. Bearing in mind that this would also involve one or both clubs at the bottom seriously getting their act together as well.

 

Almost all of the upside here is premised on the idea other clubs will come hunting in the summer and he will voluntarily leave without compensation. With respect, that is not a 'look at the facts' analysis. If we finish 10th having exited both cups early, why will he be poached? The realistic upside on waiting til the summer and moving him on then, is a few months' wages. 

[johnstone]

Shit signings in the summer.

players constantly changing position.

tactically all over the place.

But for me it’s the standard of football at home that is the nail in the coffin. It’s is fucking dreadful and possibly the worst I have seen at Fir Park for years.

[David]

10 hours ago, Inthebasement said:

Almost all of the upside here is premised on the idea other clubs will come hunting in the summer and he will voluntarily leave without compensation. With respect, that is not a 'look at the facts' analysis. If we finish 10th having exited both cups early, why will he be poached? The realistic upside on waiting til the summer and moving him on then, is a few months' wages. 

Not really. The upside for me is maintaining a reasonably steady ship to try and secure SPFL status. Sacking a manager can have a detrimental effect on a squad, which could lead us to go into a bit of a tailspin while the new guy finds his feet.

There's also the potential upside of the new manager surge, and if we were in a realistic position of challenging for top six or even for 8th then I'd consider that to be a factor. But we aren't, so I don't. 

The downside of bringing a new manager in now is potentially falling into the relegation battle from the relatively safe position we're in at the moment. The upside is closing the gap on Hibs and still finishing 9th, but closer to them.

I doubt the board would be mental enough to look at that and think the potential upside outweighs the potential downside.

[santheman]

16 hours ago, Kmcalpin said:

Fair point. Going by reports more than a few players didn't know where they were meant to be playing and/or weren't clear about their role.  I suspect a fair few also took the same view as we fans when they learnt the team i.e. Whats that????

i really expected him to start with the same team and formation he had against Hamilton with perhaps a minor tweak here and there then introduce the 2 new boys at some point in the 2nd half depending on how the game was going. It was always going to be a midfield battle against County and we basically  handed it to them on a plate with our formation.

[Kmcalpin]

40 minutes ago, santheman said:

i really expected him to start with the same team and formation he had against Hamilton with perhaps a minor tweak here and there then introduce the 2 new boys at some point in the 2nd half depending on how the game was going. It was always going to be a midfield battle against County and we basically  handed it to them on a plate with our formation.

Very much my view.  We had several weeks off to prepare for this game and still blew it.  Ok, I accept ring rustiness can be a factor. Surely the management must have known County's strengths and weaknesses beforehand and I really thought we'd be prepared and set up to handle a midfield battle.  Unless he was unfit, Allan Campbell, should have been one of the first names on the teamsheet.

[Winning by Name]

14 hours ago, johnstone said:

Shit signings in the summer.

players constantly changing position.

tactically all over the place.

But for me it’s the standard of football at home that is the nail in the coffin. It’s is fucking dreadful and possibly the worst I have seen at Fir Park for years.

I agree with this completely.

[supermarv]

Would he still have been here if he never win at Accies? Absolutely not 

[Ya Bezzer!]

17 hours ago, star sail said:

Interesting to read some of the Craig Brown comments. Sometimes I think that many fans buy into a Scottish good, non Scottish bad mentality. Interesting that the three managers you mention are non- Scottish. What about Malpas (26% win), McLeish (28% win), Davies (31% win)? Does enthusiasm and positivity make you a chancer? If it does Maurice Malpas was certainly no chancer!!!

Here is a couple of facts regarding the names you mention. Jim Gannon left the club in late December 2009 when we were 6th in the league. We finished that season 5th under Brown.  Gannon had to perform one of the biggest rebuilding jobs in the club recent history after one of the other 'old Scottish fitba favourites' Mark McGhee left us in a shambolic state.

Baraclough's win record at Motherwell was 34%. Craig Browns win record at Aberdeen was 33%. I am not trying to argue that Craig Brown was a poor manager, far from it, he was the right man at the right time for our club. It's just that the records of our  foreign chancers are not as poor as some would have us believe.

My point is that all the managers mentioned contributed in their own way. Gannon rebuilt a depleted squad, Baraclough saved us from relegation as did Robinson when he came in. It seems to me that there are some sections of our support that give managers a tougher critique when they are not Scottish.

These managers you'd dredged up, none of them were any good at our club but I was defending a position on 'a Craig Brown type'.   That's why I mentioned Craig Brown, a manager that competed well at international level, not as a defence of all Scottish born managers we've ever employed.  

As for Gannon, Baraclough and Robinson, I see them all as imported failures with a rather shallow level of expertise who managed to bluffed their way into a higher level in Scottish football than they would have been able to do so elsewhere.  The very fact that these guys were non Scots, that they came from outside Scotland allowed them positions they would never have been appointed to if they had been Scottish.  So while even guys like Davies and McLeish achieved success elsewhere at a higher level, Gannon and Baraclough achieved nothing aside from perhaps in Gannon's case, sealing the deal on a Y reg Vauxhall Cavalier.  Davies and McLeish didn't work out for us.  But Gannon and Barraclough they just weren't any good.  If anyone see's Robinson going on to success post Motherwell than that's your opinion, it's currently an unknown, but I throw my hat in the 'don't see it happening' ring.

As for your defence of Gannon - it's laughable.  Even putting aside the turmoil Gannon created at the club in his time here he won 4 out of 17 league matches, won 1 out of his last 10, the last two of which were a shambolic 6-1 defeat to Rangers and a 3-1 defeat at home to St. Johnstone.  Many of these poor results where down to the downright bizarre decisions by Gannon in terms of tactics, team selection and substitutions, the managerial equivalent of self harming.  The man was a cancer yet many here took in his snake oil salesman patter for far too long and apparently some still believe it.  Craig Brown came in and undoubtedly turned the club around and I'm sure  deep down you know this.  It's that apparent.

Anyway let me reiterate my original point since everyone these days would rather react in mock outrage than absorb a point.

I don't care if our next manager is foreign or not - but he has to be experienced and understand how to tactically organise a side (like Brown) and not some bullshit merchant from the fringes of professional football (like Gannon, Baraclough and Robinson).

[star sail]

3 hours ago, Ya Bezzer! said:

 

Anyway let me reiterate my original point since everyone these days would rather react in mock outrage than absorb a point.

I was not reacting with outrage, mock or otherwise. I absorbed your point. Craig Brown was a good manager for us. 

I have spent years on here defending honest professionals doing the best job they can against guys like yourself that call them chancers, car salesmen etc. They may not be the best managers in the world but they all contributed to keeping motherwell in the top division. Some of the hem including Robinson work very hard to do so. I think they deserve to have somebody defend them.  Seems strange to me that Baraclough is a chancer with a 34% win record, yet Browns 34% win record at Aberdeen with more resources automatically puts him in the experienced  coach who can organise a team catagory. 

I will reiterate again, I have nothing against Craig Brown, just the prejudice that makes one man be treated harsher than another. 

 

[Ya Bezzer!]

3 minutes ago, star sail said:

I was not reacting with outrage, mock or otherwise. I absorbed your point. Craig Brown was a good manager for us. 

I have spent years on here defending honest professionals doing the best job they can against guys like yourself that call them chancers, car salesmen etc. They may not be the best managers in the world but they all contributed to keeping motherwell in the top division. Some of the hem including Robinson work very hard to do so. I think they deserve to have somebody defend them.  Seems strange to me that Baraclough is a chancer with a 34% win record, yet Browns 34% win record at Aberdeen with more resources automatically puts him in the experienced  coach who can organise a team catagory. 

I will reiterate again, I have nothing against Craig Brown, just the prejudice that makes one man be treated harsher than another. 

 

Well with the 'outrage' comment I didn't mean you in particular.  I inflated to  a general point to avoid getting personal towards another poster and seem to have achieved the opposite affect.

I'd also point out that while I grouped Baraclough, Robinson and Gannon together in a broad grouping I specifically referred to Gannon as a cancer.  I think he  was, my opinion of course and I believe history proves me right, but I wouldn't compare either Baraclough or Robinson to Gannon in that sense. 

Baraclough and Robinson seem to me to be decent guys that don't do an admittedly very hard job well enough.  For me they have been put into positions that are beyond them. They are no Jim Gannon.  If Baraclough or Robinson were better managers I'd be fine with them, I wouldn't want Gannon at the club under any circumstances because he was a rotten individual.

Brown's record is across his career, not cherry picked from his last role in football.  It's 21 years since a Scotland team made it to a Finals so perhaps that length of absence should have had people contemplate Brown's role in that, which is, after all, the highest and most difficult level of football to compete at.  How many Scottish managers have won a world title, albeit at youth level?  And his record at Motherwell is one of the best  of any post war Motherwell manager in terms of win percentage.  Perhaps if Brown has taken us all the way to the Scottish Final that season, with all his managerial experience,  it might have been different although I accept that's speculation.  

In any case, Baraclough, nice man that he was, doesn't compare to Brown as a figure in the football world and is but a footnote In Scottish football to anyone not Motherwell minded.  Harsh but true and I'm afraid that's the nature of football.

[superward]

Absorbed.

[star sail]

28 minutes ago, Ya Bezzer! said:

Well with the 'outrage' comment I didn't mean you in particular.  I inflated to  a general point to avoid getting personal towards another poster and seem to have achieved the opposite affect.

I'd also point out that while I grouped Baraclough, Robinson and Gannon together in a broad grouping I specifically referred to Gannon as a cancer.  I think he  was, my opinion of course and I believe history proves me right, but I wouldn't compare either Baraclough or Robinson to Gannon in that sense. 

Baraclough and Robinson seem to me to be decent guys that don't do an admittedly very hard job well enough.  For me they have been put into positions that are beyond them. They are no Jim Gannon.  If Baraclough or Robinson were better managers I'd be fine with them, I wouldn't want Gannon at the club under any circumstances because he was a rotten individual.

Brown's record is across his career, not cherry picked from his last role in football.  It's 21 years since a Scotland team made it to a Finals so perhaps that length of absence should have had people contemplate Brown's role in that, which is, after all, the highest and most difficult level of football to compete at.  How many Scottish managers have won a world title, albeit at youth level?  And his record at Motherwell is one of the best  of any post war Motherwell manager in terms of win percentage.  Perhaps if Brown has taken us all the way to the Scottish Final that season, with all his managerial experience,  it might have been different although I accept that's speculation.  

In any case, Baraclough, nice man that he was, doesn't compare to Brown as a figure in the football world and is but a footnote In Scottish football to anyone not Motherwell minded.  Harsh but true and I'm afraid that's the nature of football.

Despite the difference of opinion, I always enjoy reading what you have to say.

 

[ropy]

On 1/21/2019 at 9:52 PM, Inthebasement said:

Almost all of the upside here is premised on the idea other clubs will come hunting in the summer and he will voluntarily leave without compensation. With respect, that is not a 'look at the facts' analysis. If we finish 10th having exited both cups early, why will he be poached? The realistic upside on waiting til the summer and moving him on then, is a few months' wages. 

I think that this year’s quarter final exit in the league cup was a ‘reasonable’ run rather than seeing it as an early exit.

[joewarkfanclub]

Craig Brown was a very good manager for us and clearly managed at a much higher level than any of our managers since.

The fact that the majority of us were absolutely raging when he did dirty on us with his 3 day turn around routine, should be ample evidence of how good he was for our club at the time.

Unfortunately Scottish football, and the nature of our club has changed too much since then and I dont see us being able to attract a "Craig Brown type" to the club any time soon with the finances available to us.

Id love to be wrong, but I think our choices are either one of the usual suspects, or take a chance on a young up and coming manager who will cut his teeth here and move on to better things

Ive not 100% given up on Robbo yet but Id be happy to give Crags a proper shot or someone like Gary Naysmith who is doing well at QoS with very limited resources.

 

[ScottW1886]

I left the game on Saturday convinced he had to go... In the cold light of day I think there's still a glimmer of hope for him, if he can implement this new style of play.

The thought of going to the game tonight fills me with no excitement, it's dread which is quite a damning situation I suppose.

On his preferred style of play, it's not pretty but it can be effective if the players implement it correctly. A long ball is perfectly fine as long as it's not aimless, which is unfortunately what we're getting a lot of the time. I was watching a video of some of Motherwell's best goals of recent times, and 3 of them would hardly be described as total football - Moult scored 2 lobs directly from a long ball from a defender and Jutkiewicz turned an aimless punt into one of the best goals seen in Scotland. The key thing is that the players involved either worked hard to make something of the situation or the long ball was played into space for them. The long ball at present is doing nothing positive. Last season the midfield were pressing and winning the second balls, which we aren't doing this season, so we're making nothing of the direct balls at all and that's where it becomes very unattractive and frustrating to watch.

If Gillespie puts a long ball right onto the head of a forward tonight who knocks it down for a team mate to volley a shot into the top corner we'll be delighted, and it won't get much more direct than that...

[Yodo]

If we lose tonight I would expect him to be gone in the morning ,can't work out why people still want to give him the benefit of the doubt . I have no doubt we won't be relagated but that is because the teams below us are terrible however if Accies do their usual and manage a run and Dundee get their act together then we could end up in the play off position .

[smiddy]

hiya yodo ,,,, welcome back with your negativity,,,,, its all ifs, n maybes, IF yir maw had bawz she wid be yir da,,, n all that, the fact is we cant afford to pay him off and we cant afford to get relegated, so we juggle all the balls in the air at the one time and hope like feck we are the 3rd shitiest team in the league, hopefully McCormack will be our difference but we shall see a point tonight ??? but deffo cant get beat on sat ,,,,,,,,, over to you yodo 

[Yoshi-1991]

Just bought himself another few weeks of humming and hawing.

[postiejim]

Certainly did well tonight , credit to him and the team.

[prideoflanarkshire]

Credit to him and the team. Got it spot on tonight

[Shaka]

Typical Robbo. Pull a result out the bag to take the heat off. Going by his previous record, we will be back to shite cone saturday.

[mfc]

I'm not a fan of robinson but fair play for making the necessary changes tonight after that shambles on saturday but he really needs to start getting a settled side on the pitch, even if that means leaving some of his favourites out the team.

[Al B]

Stephen Robinson was asked to get us a run in the cups. He's reached two finals. (You can talk all you want about how losing 2 finals isn't an achievement, but he wasn't asked to WIN cups, he was asked to get a run in cups, and he achieved that, therefore in the tick-box exercise that is a company performance review, it's an achievement).

He was asked to bring in money through player sales. Club has brought in more money under him than any other manager (I think).

He was asked to keep us clear of a relegation battle. We are comfortably clear of a relegation battle.

He was asked to do it all within a very restricted budget. He has done that.

He was asked to promote youth into the first team. He has done that.

In the form table over the last 5 games, we're 6th.

In the form table over the last 10 games, we're 6th.

In the form table over the last 15 games, we're....yup, you guessed it... 6th.

 

Now, you can debate opinion on how much you enjoy the games, how you feel we're doing, who you think should play, how you think we should set up.... until the cows come home, I have mine, everyone else has theirs, and they are probably all variations of a theme. However, the club look at the things on the list, a return on their remit. It's objective and it's fact based.

Putting aside what you "think" or "feel" for a moment. Could we as a club get a manager that would exceed what's on that list above? Are the club going to want to get rid of someone that's exceeded everything in the remit that they put in front of him? What has he not delivered on that would make the club consider his position?

Sorry if you're not happy, but it doesn't matter what you or I think. It's not about opinions. Stephen Robinson is currently in the middle of being an extremely successful Motherwell manager relative to what the club have asked of him, and that's what his employment status is based on. The idea that they would even be considering punting him is a massive LOL.

[Yorkyred]

17 hours ago, Yodo said:

If we lose tonight I would expect him to be gone in the morning ,can't work out why people still want to give him the benefit of the doubt . I have no doubt we won't be relagated but that is because the teams below us are terrible however if Accies do their usual and manage a run and Dundee get their act together then we could end up in the play off position .

And last nights result is why, he always pulls it out of the bag when needed. We won’t finish in the play offs, not even close in my view.